


I've Done This Before (but i'll be better this time)

by Serie11



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Fights, Gen, Nora Customs, Pre-Relationship, Some Plot, Time Travel, Video Game Mechanics, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-10-03 21:11:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20459531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serie11/pseuds/Serie11
Summary: Aloy wakes up in a very familar place, with a very familar person waiting for her outside the cabin.She's done this before.





	I've Done This Before (but i'll be better this time)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Charientist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Charientist/gifts).

Aloy blinks open her eyes and pauses.

She’s staring at a roof – a very familiar roof. A roof that is _too _familiar.

This is Rost’s cabin.

She has not slept here since before the Proving. Too many emotions tied up inside her, twisting and making her chest ache. The last thing she remembers… is collapsing beside Elisabet’s body, and letting the ring of flowers soothe her, their soft scent making their way into her dreams. She must be dreaming – that’s it. She’s never had a dream this vivid, but Rost had told her that it could happen.

She tests if she can sit up, and she can. The cabin is all wrong – she’d moved all the furniture inside, shut the cabin up for a long absence, so the wind and the rain wouldn’t be able to get in and ruin all the things that could possibly rot. But the windows are open now, and the remnants of a fire smoulders in the hearth. It’s wrong, but it’s a dream, so she supposes that it makes sense that the cabin would look like she remembers, from her childhood. That’s what’s most clear to her.

She gets dressed more out of habit than anything else. She doesn’t exactly know what to do – what _can _she do, in a dream like this? She’s never been in a situation like this before. It’s strange – she’s not used to the clothes she’s wearing now, the tried and true outcast garment that served her well for so many years. It’s so light compared to the armour that she normally dons.

Outside, fresh snow litters their gully, crisp and white in the morning sun. Aloy shoots some arrows into the grazer dummies for the sake of it, smirking as all of them hit the bull’s eyes. The past year of living on the edge has sharpened her aim.

It’s only when she goes to cross the bridge that she stumbles, feeling like someone has taken their fist to her gut. _It’s just a dream, just a dream,_ she tells herself, feeling almost numb. There, standing in his favourite spot, is Rost. She never knew why he always liked to look out over the valley. Now she knows why he’s staring down at the villages. It’s easy enough from here to track the more inexperienced hunters – is that why Rost had called her, urgently, sometimes? Had he spotted a Nora in danger, and rushed to the rescue? Had he still felt responsible for the Nora, even until the end?

She crosses the bridge, knees shaking, and climbs the ridge. He turns as she approaches, and she feels herself start to tear up – if this is a dream, it’s a cruel one. He looks so alive, so big and wise.

“Aloy. You’re here.”

She’s too choked up to speak, she realises. Even if she wasn’t, what would she say?

Rost’s forehead furrows slightly. “I know the Proving is only two days away… it is okay to be worried.”

Aloy takes a step forward and crashes into him, arms hugging him tightly. Rost has never been one to initiate physical contact most of the time, but he’s always there if she needs it. Sure enough, his arms curl around her back, and she puts her head against his chest and listens to his heartbeat. _Alive, alive. _Even though she knows it isn’t true, she lets herself believe, just for a second.

“What’s wrong?” Rost asks her.

“J-just a nightmare,” Aloy manages to say, because she can’t think of anything else. It is true, in a way – a nightmare that has been haunting her for a year now, always hovering over her shoulder.

Rost tightens his grip on her before he releases her. “You are quite old to be having nightmares,” he says, and while his voice isn’t chastising, it does invoke a question.

“It was just… about losing you,” Aloy admits quietly. If she’d been the girl she had been a year ago, she would not have seen the dismay flash across his face, quickly hidden.

“It would have to be a great force to part us,” Rost says solemnly. “Are you feeling better now?”

She nods.

“Good.” Rost looks happier to be on steady ground. “I have been thinking about your training. You’ve learned to hunt, to survive. But I fear there’s a lesson I’ve failed to teach you. Would you learn it now?”

“Of course,” Aloy promises. She would always listen to him.

“There has been some trouble, recently,” Rost tells her, sounding distracted. “It affords an opportunity to learn this lesson, but it will be dangerous. You must come prepared… or you will die. Descend into the Embrace and hunt until you have gathered the parts for fire arrows.”

“Fire arrows?” Aloy asks. This is all seeming… very familiar.

“Once you have the parts, meet me at the gate beyond the village of Mother’s Heart.”

“The North Gate?” Aloy asks, because that’s what he would be expecting. That’s why this conversation is familiar – tonight Rost wants her to go and hunt the sawtooth with him, to try and show her how she must live when she passes the Proving.

“Yes. Now be on your way.”

“Right,” Aloy says. She stands there, and stares for a few more seconds though, because seeing him again is something that she might not be able to do. After all, it’s only a matter of time before she wakes up.

“Is something wrong?” Rost asks again, and Aloy shakes her head. Rost tilts his head towards the slipwire, and Aloy can’t help but huff as she steps towards it. Even in her dreams, it seems that Rost is destined to be… well, Rost.

* * *

Here’s the thing that is beginning to worry her – the dream _isn’t ending. _

She has hunted the herds throughout the Embrace, using scant arrows to take down the maximum amount of machines. It’s meant that she’s gotten used to using this type of bow again – she misses her fancy ones that are made in Meridian. She made this herself, and haven’t used it in quite some time. She visits Karst and buys everything that she can from him, making him raise his eyebrows at the amount of shards that she gives him, and doesn’t even try to barter. That’s habit, too. She’s used to having more shards than she knows what to do with.

She stalks extra machines because it’s only just past sun high and she has no idea what else to do. The Embrace is vivid and green, life sprawling carelessly – no black scars marring the landscape. She does a flurry of tasks for other people, too – all things that she vaguely remembers, small parts of one day that was buried under the grief of the Proving.

Even when she meets up with Rost again, and shocks him with how well and how easily she takes down the sawtooth, she’s still expecting to wake up at any second. It’s not until she goes to sleep for the night (after staring at Rost for just another minute, _just another minute_), and _wakes up _in the same bed the next morning, that she starts to have doubts.

If this is a dream, it’s the most detailed one she’s ever had. And she’s beginning to doubt that it’s a dream. But if it isn’t – what then?

She continues to hunt through the Embrace, the question plaguing her all day. She finds more and more evidence that this is a past that she remembers, more people asking her to do favours for her. She goes to the gate that was demolished when the invasion happened, and stares at it for at least half an hour, trying to reconcile her memories with what she can see. The gate is standing, tall and proud. And the trees and forest around it are unmarred, untouched.

“Okay,” Aloy says to herself. “I might be starting to freak out.”

She meets up with Rost, and remembers the harsh words that she said to him the last time she was here. She takes his token, and closes her eyes for a second, letting her anger and her fear and her love well up inside of her.

“I understand,” she tells him gently. “It is your way to follow the laws of the tribe, even when your very heart calls out against it. If it truly is your wish, that you do not want to see me again… I will abide by it. Even if it breaks my own heart.”

“Aloy,” Rost says, sorrow deep in his eyes. They regard each other silently for several seconds. Aloy clenches his token in her fist tightly, feeling the edge of it dig into her palm. If nothing else… she can give them both closure here. And if she knows what is going to happen… then perhaps she can change it.

“And even if I don’t see you, that doesn’t mean you won’t see me, right?” she dares to ask. “I know you too well – it will just be from a distance, but you’ll check in on me every now and then, won’t you? I bet you’ll even watch me take the Proving.”

Rost startles slightly, and she can’t help but smirk at having caught him out. She had never been able to do that very often. Even if her foreknowledge had helped, it still warms her heart to see that surprised look on his face.

“Yes,” he grudgingly admits. “My tracking skills are good for something. I will watch you take the Proving. After all,” his eyes glint. “I want to make sure that all I’ve taught you has not gone to waste. I expect you to put on a very good show.”

“I’m going to come first,” she promises him. “I’m going to win.”

“I know you will.” He lifts his arms, and Aloy hugs him again, tightly. He smells like leather and the plant wax that he uses on his arrows.

“I love you,” Aloy whispers.

“I love you too,” Rost sighs. “Now go. And enjoy the celebrations.”

“I promise,” Aloy nods. It’s hard to walk away – to take another step, and another. But if she’s going to rely on what she remembers, she needs to be in the right place to take advantage of it. She needs to run the Proving, like she did before.

Mother’s Heart is… loud. It’s not as overwhelming as it once was to her, because she’s far more used to people than she used to be. Still, it’s strange to walk among the Nora and for them to glance aside when they look at her, instead of calling her _Anointed. _She doesn’t miss it. It’s just strange. Maybe she can avoid that, this time around. If this dream continues for that long.

She meets up with Teb, and makes sure her heartfelt gratitude is felt. It feels good to leave him stuttering, and with dusty red cheeks. She drifts through the festival, half listening to the stories that everyone else has heard from childhood, but it’s not until she sees a half familiar flash of dark hair with a blue headband that she pauses.

_Vala. _The girl that had been the one to welcome her first, who had defended her from the other Nora who were taking the Proving. Aloy doesn’t think that she’d spotted her the first time that she had wondered around the village, but she hadn’t known her back then. She shifts direction slightly, making it seem more of an accident than anything else when she bumps into the other girl.

“Sorry,” Aloy says, mouth suddenly dry. She’d _liked _Vala, a lot. Her death had been the follow up wound to Rost’s, another kick when she was already down. Maybe… if she could save them _both_…

“No problem,” Vala says. Her eyes dart over Aloy critically, making assumptions and observations and guesses. “You’re the outcast, aren’t you?”

“Is it that obvious?” Aloy asks wryly. Last time she’d been the only person who didn’t know anyone else in the Proving contestant cabin, but this time they’re just standing on a street, in front of a fireplace, children running around them. Are children always so _loud? _

“I know all of the Nora,” Vala tells her. “Don’t feel too torn about it. Everyone here should know who you are. That, or they deliberately not paying attention. Or they’re kids.” She huffs a laugh at herself. “I know who you are.”

“Aloy,” Aloy says, introducing herself. The Nora don’t take each other’s names lightly – they are a gift from All Mother herself. Others only use them when they are given permission. Rost says that’s why the Nora are so big on _structured hierarchy – _if everyone has a title, then you don’t need to be rude and ask for their name. You can simply use their title, and everyone else knows who you’re talking about.

Aloy doesn’t mind Vala having her name. And honestly, she’s not too sure how she feels about the entire name business, anyway. It’s easier just to get this over with, now.

Vala’s eyebrow ticks up, and they pause for a second as she obviously considers her next move.

“Vala,” she says, reaching out her hand. Aloy grasps her forearm in a warrior’s grip, appropriate even if they’re not braves quite yet. Vala returns the grasp, and Aloy meets her eyes as they shake.

“I’m pleased to know you,” Aloy says politely, and Vala laughs.

“No need to be so formal. We’re still just kids, you know – we don’t have any real responsibilities until tomorrow. The Proving shows which of us are destined for a life as a brave, and who isn’t.”

“Well, I know I am,” Aloy says. “What about you?”

“I’m going to win the Proving tomorrow,” Vala says confidently. Aloy wonders if she missed this brashness the last time they talked, or if it was overshadowed by everything that came after, or if she was just young and didn’t notice it. Vala is young, as well. And as she said, neither of them should have anything they have to worry about, not yet. They’re still children in the eyes of the tribe, with no adult responsibilities until they pass this milestone.

“Well, don’t count yourself a winner just yet,” Aloy warns. “I have my eye on first place as well.” She remembers this conversation almost being the other way around when they first had it. Is that a reflection of how much she’s grown?

“Being raised in the wilds would have taught you much,” Vala acknowledges. “But I have trained under my mother, the leader of the braves. She doesn’t accept anything but precision, and skill. You’ll have your work cut out for you if you want to try and beat me.”

“Well, we’ll just have to wait and see. The Proving is tomorrow, so whoever is right will be proved right soon enough,” Aloy says, resisting the urge to laugh at her small pun. “Until then… do you know anything that I need to do at the festival before I turn in for the night?”

Vala tilts her head slightly, but Aloy sees the moment that she decides that she likes Aloy. “I do indeed,” she says. “And I need a partner to do it well. Care to join me?”

“Of course,” Aloy says, something like happiness curling in her belly. Even though Vala knows that she’s an outcast, she doesn’t judge her, and wants to spend time with her. She knew that was the truth, because it’s what had happened last time, but it’s still refreshing. Vala sees Aloy for who she is, not what the tribe thinks of her. Besides Varl, and maybe Teb, she doesn’t think any of the other Nora have done that, ever.

She follows Vala up the path, and resolves to save her as well.

* * *

Vala leads her through a Nora dance, and tells Aloy that she has ‘two left feet.’ They spin, and twirl, and Aloy can hardly hear the music over the thumping of her heart in her ears, and can’t see anything besides Vala’s smile. The other girl shows her where the best hearth of meat is being prepared, and tells Aloy about how it was prepared, what combination of spices that the Nora prefer. They’re similar to Rost’s tastes, but Aloy can see some clear differences where they diverge.

It’s not until they’re standing in front of a stage, watching the Matriarchs welcome the Carja, that Aloy realises that she has to talk to two of the visitors.

She stares at Olin and struggles with what she has to do. If she doesn’t talk to him or Erend, HADES won’t know about her existence. Probably, the Proving tomorrow will go off without a hitch. Except…

It takes more than one night to travel from Meridian to Mother’s Heart. Helis _must _already be here – he must have aimed to slaughter the contestants of the Proving in order to disrupt any peace between the Nora and the Carja, to stop the Carja from receiving any aid from the Nora. But if HADES knows that she is here, then she’ll have the advantage of all the attention being focused on her. It’s a risk, but it’s a known risk. She doesn’t know what will happen if she isn’t revealed to Olin, and she doesn’t particular want to find out.

The next time someone pushes between her and Vala, she steps aside. It only takes a few seconds to cross to Olin, who looks at her curiously.

“Hi,” Aloy says. “I noticed you’ve got a Focus.”

“A Nora, wearing one of these? Impossible,” Olin replies, looking shocked.

“Well I’m standing right in front of you, so maybe not as impossible as you might think.”

His Focus sparks, and he grunts in pain. Aloy clenches her jaw for a second before speaking again.

“Are you alright?”

“It’s nothing, just a malfunction,” Olin blusters. “I really must get going.”

Aloy lets him turn his back. The message is delivered – now she needs to think of a plan for tomorrow.

“Hey there!”

Erend comes down the steps, and Aloy is far more happy to talk to him. Vala comes to her elbow halfway through, and she introduces her to Erend.

“Are you always so free with your name?” Vala asks in an undertone as they leave the presentation behind.

“I haven’t had much cause to give out before today,” Aloy reminds her wryly. Vala shakes her head.

“I suppose that’s true. The lantern festival is next – it’s an honour to participate in it. We should head there now, to get a good spot!”

“Sounds like a plan,” Aloy agrees.

* * *

The Proving is just how she remembers it, and yet completely different, too.

She does not hold her trophy aloft in victory – she does not let Bast destroy it, guards it zealously against any of the other contestants who might not want her to succeed at all. Ignoring Bast’s taunts last night was trivial, especially with Vala laughing and talking by her side. Aloy keeps an eye on her as she effortlessly takes down a grazer and starts sprinting towards the start of the track.

She does not know the new track, but she braved the old one once before. She can do it again. She ignores the shout of the brave standing guard, and flings herself across the gully, light steps on the unsteady pillars. The last one tilts, but that’s fine – she remembers that. She keeps a sharp eye out for where the ambush is going to happen, and learns the lay of the land as best she can.

Aloy has lived her whole life in the Embrace, but she’s never been up here before, besides on that one fateful day. So when she sees the place that she knows the ambush came from, she hesitates, pulse loud and breathing heavy. She already has her answers – and she knows that she can win the Proving. She doesn’t _actually _need to finish this race. It’s only another second’s thought to turn and slink through the grass, bow already in her hand. She’d stocked up on as many arrows as possible, knowing that this moment would come. She’d shared some of her supplies with Vala last night in the hope that the other girl would be able to use them, but she still has more than enough.

She grips a ledge and hauls herself up, only to roll into the nearby grass as she hears a voice. Heart thumping in her chest, she holds steady, waiting for a cry of alarm.

She pushes through the grass as slowly as she can, and isn’t surprised by the amount of warriors she can see marching up towards where she’s sitting. Grimly, she counts them, and almost loses her head when she spots Helis in the back. She’d enjoyed killing him once, and doing it again would be her pleasure.

She doesn’t have much time before they’re in place. She can hear the shouts of the other contestants now, approaching the finishing line. She sets two traps near the mouth of the gully where they’re going to come out, and slides down through the grass towards them. The Eclipse aren’t loud, but none of them are expecting enemy action. It’s easy to take down one, and then two more, her spear sharp and ready.

Aloy secrets their bodies in the grass, but then focuses as she spots the Eclipse with the deathbringer gun. _That _has to be her priority – the gun was what took down so many of the young Nora. She threads three arrows onto her bow, and gets into the best position she can. This will bring all of them down on her, but more than half have passed her now, and she intends to run _away _from the area the Proving is being run in.

She stands, aims, and fires.

The triple shot takes down the gunner, and immediate chaos breaks out. Shouts rise up, and Aloy marks the men who try to quiet the rest with her Focus. They’re probably leaders of some sort – Helis looks wrathful, and Aloy can’t help but feel quite smug about that. Anything that inconveniences him _definitely _counts as a win.

“Who is there?!” Helis thunders, and Aloy glides through the tall grass silently. They’re already converging on where she took the shot from, and she lays a shock wire between herself and all of them, and stands up.

“Hey, idiots!” she shouts. “I’m over here!”

Helis’s face goes white, then red. Aloy has a moment to pick off two other Shadow Carja before someone triggers her tripwire, and she uses the resulting explosion of electricity to start running.

Someone starts up the gun, the loud _pat pat pat _of the metal impacting stone. Aloy puts her head down and runs faster, faster, before ducking behind an outcropping and using a precious few seconds to shoot off some more arrows. She’s slowly thinning the amount of Eclipse, but Helis is still leading the charge, and he is _hard _to kill.

“Aloy!”

She spins on the spot, and goggles at Vala and Bast. Bast is scowling, but the expression seems to be more directed at the horde of soldiers running up the gully than at Aloy. Vala’s cheeks are flushed, but she already has her bow out. There’s a steely look in her eye that Aloy wouldn’t want to go up against.

“What are you doing here?” Aloy demands, looking behind them. She doesn’t know this area well, so she might have accidentally circled around so that she’s near the end of the Proving. Damn it.

“Helping you,” Bast grunts. He whips his bow off his back and shoots, and Aloy hears a strangled shout.

“What is that noise?” Vala asks as the thundering of the gun starts up again.

“A machine that can spit metal – it’s deadly, so stay away from it!” Aloy shouts. Her goal here was to protect them… but maybe they can protect themselves, if they know what to look for. “There are a lot of them, be careful! We should stick together.”

“Mother watch over us,” Bast murmurs under his breath. “There’s so many of them!”

“We should run!” Aloy suggests, following her own advice. Gratifyingly, she hears both of them start to chase after her.

“There’s a dead end valley we could take advantage of – your climbing is pretty good, so I know you’re up for it,” Vala says, smirking.

“Ice Ridge Canyon?” Bast asks, throwing a glance over his shoulder at their pursuers.

“Yep.”

“You’re crazy. Let’s do it.”

“Lead the way,” Aloy says, and Vala speeds up to take the lead.

The valley has steep walls and a hard end. Vala goes to the right and leaps up one ledge, clearly knowing what she’s doing.

“Follow me,” Bast says tensely, and Aloy bites back a sharp retort as he jumps up the cliff after Vala. If he’s going to help, she probably shouldn’t antagonise him… right at this second.

The grips are almost well-worn under her hands – this must be a training wall of some sort for the young Nora who are hoping to be braves. Vala and Bast seem to know it well enough, because she has to push herself to keep up with them.

At the top of the cliff, there is a flat, open area with several trees forming a border. Aloy looks down and shakes her head as Eclipse start pouring into the valley.

“Wait,” she says sharply as Bast starts to draw back his bow.

“Why?” Bast asks, but he doesn’t loose his arrow.

“The more that come in, the more trapped they’ll be,” Vala breathes. “Target the ones near the entrance first.”

Aloy nocks an arrow, and spots Helis near the mouth of the gully. “Shoot now!” she yells, and aims an arrow straight at the commander.

Helis snatches her arrow out of the air before it can hit him, but Vala and Bast’s arrows find targets in the grunts that are starting to mill around the base of the cliff. Aloy doesn’t let her miss dissuade her, and keeps firing. If she had her slingshot with a few bombs this would be so much easier…

“Fall back!” Helis yells, and the Eclipse are trying to follow his orders but the thin entrance is hampering their progress. Helis is the last person alive to leave the death trap, and Aloy meets his eyes in the few seconds he has before he turns. They’re burning with a zealotry that makes her shudder.

Even when they’re gone, Aloy still grips her bow tightly, unsure. The last time this had happened, Helis had thought he had killed her… him walking away still knowing that she’s alive is going to change things, she’s sure.

“We should get back to the others,” Aloy says. “Did you two finish the Proving?”

“No,” Bast says shortly. And _oh, _that’s why he’s so angry. Not at Aloy, but at Vala.

“I heard the shouts,” Vala says. “And I’d seen you go on the old path – I figured that it had to be you in trouble. And with the amount of noise, there had to be more than one person you were up against. You didn’t have to come with me,” she tells Bast.

Bast glowers at her. “And let you show me up by rescuing the rest of the candidates? Don’t be stupid.”

“We should go,” Aloy says, because she doesn’t know if Helis will come back for her, and she wants to have the protection of walls around her. She needs better gear, damn it. And she needs to plan her next move.

“You’re not welcome back in the village, _outcast,_” Bast spits. “You didn’t finish the Proving, so you’re not a brave.”

Aloy stares at him dispassionately for several seconds. “You didn’t finish the Proving either, so you can’t tell me what to do. I’m going to go and tell the Matriarchs about this attack. If you could back me up by saying that I’m telling the truth, that would be nice of you.”

“_Nice of me –!” _

“Bast,” Vala says sharply. “We have bigger things to worry about. Save it for later.”

Aloy lets out a sigh, and gratefully follows Vala as she walks towards the trees. At the moment, the only person she wants to be following is Vala. Vala casts a look bac at her, and smiles at Aloy when she catches her looking. Aloy’s heart warms, sudden hope springing forth. They’d beaten back the Eclipse, and they’re here to warn the Nora about the attack. Between the three of them, they’d handled it quite well. She’s sure that they’ll be able to handle any other attacks just as well, especially if she’s conscious this time instead of passed out in the heart of the mountain.

And if Vala has lived through this… then there’s no reason that she can’t live through what’s to come, as well. Aloy speeds up to walk by her side, and Vala’s hand brushes hers. There’s something else in her eyes when their gazes meet. Vala’s head tilts to the side slightly, but there’s a warmth in her eyes that Aloy can’t help but return. If Vala is alive… there’s hope. A hope that Aloy had thought crushed before it ever begun to bloom. That maybe, Vala might be interested in exploring a relationship that had been destroyed before Aloy had realised what it could become. Aloy wants to... and now she'll be able to ask if Vala wants to, as well. 

Aloy grins and accepts Vala’s promise, returns it with one of her own. She takes in a deep breath of the cold air, and revels in the feeling of being alive.

Rost and Vala have lived through the Proving. She’s looking forward to what will happen next. 

**Author's Note:**

> I've been thinking for ages that I should do something around the New Game+ mechanic, so... here it is! I hope you enjoyed this little spot of fix it time travel 😊

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Another Dawn](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26314894) by [jadetea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jadetea/pseuds/jadetea)


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